Loop
by Phantom Lightning
Summary: Tom asks Alex how to become a spy. He didn't know that Alex was waiting for that question the whole time. Last chapter up. 16/3/13: Edited the last chapter to give it a bit more closure. Still won't be continued, though.
1. Chapter 1

**I like this one.**

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><p>"Alex, how can I be a spy?" Tom said.<p>

"Well, first you have to have all your living relatives die. Make sure that at least one of them has connections to MI6. This is the easiest part of it.

"Next, make sure that one of your last relatives die in some horrible accident that wasn't really an accident. Remember, this is an extremely important stage. Make sure Mr. Blunt or Mrs. Jones sees you at his or her funeral, and try to talk to them.

"Now, investigate her 'accident' and be almost killed when you are almost destroyed in the vehicle they were using. Use awesome ninja skills to get out, and you must be caught on camera. Hopefully, they'll see what you did and want to recruit you illegally.

"Next, if someone you don't know calls you, answer it. They'll ask you to go to the bank or store which is their cover, and remember to have someone completely unrelated to you with an expired visa or something that they can use against you to live with you. They'll blackmail you, and remember to accept. Next thing you know, they'll tell you about an assassin who killed said relative and tell you to avoid him.

"Go on the suicidal mission, and be caught in several near death situations, and kill the bad guys in an unusual way. Make sure you meet the assassin and become friends with him, and remember, don't kill him. He'll be a useful asset later on some of your missions later, and he'll send you to a criminal organization. You'll go on your first mission for them, and you can't bring yourself to kill your target, no matter how much you hate them or ruined your life. Later on, join the organization permanently after you choose a successor.

"Good luck getting to be a teenage spy!"

Tom realized that Alex had stopped using the 'him or her' in several places, but he just shrugged it off.

He didn't notice the part where Alex said 'teenage'.

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><p>5 days later, Tom's aunt, who was actually a spy for MI6 died.<p>

"We want you to investigate your aunt's death. We believe that Alex Rider was responsible for her death, and if you see him at all, contact us and we'll pick you up. Do not, under any circumstances, listen to him."

Tom suddenly remembered their conversation, and how Alex disappeared a few days ago.

Alex did know what he was doing, after all. And Tom was his successor.

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><p><strong>I should be updating Pitch Black feathers (formerly known as On Tattered Wings), but this was just begging to be written.<strong>


	2. Chapter 2

**This is your Christmas present.**

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><p>Tom was 15, and was MI6's second best spy.<p>

Second only to the legendary Alex Rider, of course.

It was strange, he thought. He had never seen Alex on any mission, and he doubted that Alex was even alive anymore. It was like the only thing keeping him alive was luck.

His phone rang.

"There's something about your account that someone would like to discuss with you. He's waiting for you at his usual spot, please come here as quickly as you can."

"Tom, we believe that Scorpia is after you. There's no need for panic, but we have a safehouse ready for you in Venice. It's risky, being so close to Scorpia headquarters, but that's the only place where we can put you without putting you at risk. There's a car waiting for you outside."

Tom knew a dismissal when he heard one, and walked out the door. That was shorter than he had expected.

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><p>A person in a white cloak sat across from a man. The person's hood was down, but he sat in the darkest part of the tent they were in right now, preventing anyone from making out his facial features. The man across from him shifted uncomfortably. <em>'It really is like he brings shadows wherever he goes, like they say...' <em>The man was not fooled by the name, or the youth of the figure sitting cross legged across from him. The Angel's name was misleading; he was more like an Angel of death. He saw what had happened after a particularly slow month... The man he was sent to assassinate was strung up by hit innards on a bus. It was still not known how he had done it, and anyone who asked would be found dead in the exact same way... with no evidence.

"So, what job do you have for me?"

"I want you to capture MI6's current teenage spy."

"Oh, I've been replaced already? What are their records?"

"6 successful missions... only one failed."

"... Not as good as mine, of course."

"And you are... Angel, correct?"

"That's me."

"Excellent."

"Do I get a picture or do I have to go around capturing every teenager I find?" The Angel was a bit bored, it seemed, and when he was, that was never a good thing. The man gulped as he thought of the tales he had heard about the Angel's temper and skill level.

"Here he is... Tom Harris."

"NO. I will not do it."

"You will be paid generously, of course..." The man was stopped by a blur of silver hitting the table, centimeters away from his hand. It was a beautifully crafted silver knife, made to look exactly like a wing... with razor sharp feathers, that is.

"I will not, under any circumstances, kill him."

"Well, looks like I'll have to use other methods of persuasion, then..."

The Angel picked up the knife and slit the man's throat so quickly that he didn't even have the time to begin reaching towards the gun that the Angel had noted hidden oh-so carefully in his jacket.

"Haven't you heard? They say to never piss off an angel."

The Angel seemed to disappear in the shadows, despite it being a hot summer day, as the tent blew away into particles of sand in the hot desert wind.

There was no trace of neither man nor tent... besides the body that the buzzards came down upon to feast on.

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><p>Tom walked down a sidewalk, and saw someone that he'd thought long dead.<p>

"Alex?"

"Hello Tom. It's been quite a while, hasn't it? And please don't call me that."

"Why? It's your name, isn't it?" Tom's long-buried childish curiosity was piqued.

"It was... but not anymore. Please, it's just Angel now." Alex was cool and collected.

"Who do you work for?"

"Not Scorpia anymore. I work for a new organization... Phoenix. A man once told me these words, and now I pass them down to you... Go to Egypt. Find Phoenix. There you will find your destiny."

The Angel disappeared, leaving a shining silver knife in the shape of a wing with silver feathers.

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><p><strong>Hmm... Should I make it a three shot?<strong>


	3. Chapter 3

**Right now, you're probably looking at this and not believing it's real. xD**

**But it is real, and it's just a little slice of life to show what happened to Alex and Tom. :D**

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><p>A young man, really, only a teenager, though he looked to be at least 21 stood on a tall church spire, feet balancing gracefully on it in a way that seemed physically impossible.<p>

Except it wasn't impossible because this was Alex Rider.

Or rather, he once was.

Hundreds of personas had eroded away at his sense of identity until he was faceless, able to adopt any name and slip into it as easily as you would a new shirt. For the most part, he was genderless, too, being able to disguise himself effectively as a female, although he preferred being male. (He still wasn't over the stripper incident.) He only called himself one name—The Angel. (Well, that was only at work. Tom always called him Alex, but he didn't mind. It was nice to be able to hang on to even a scrap of his old life, back when things seemed so brighter and happier.)

The Angel was a ruthless assassin, having technology that stretched the boundaries of imagination, and was even rumoured to have no technology at all and was actually magical. He chose which people to kill, and when threatened, kept his calm and killed the person mercilessly. The victims were often found littered with small, painful cuts, bruises everywhere, deep gashes that wouldn't kill, drugs and poison that only increased their pain, and a single black feather shaped knife in their heart, the Angel's trademark. Interestingly enough, he left absolutely no fingerprints, or that that matter, any tangible trace that he was ever there.

It was obvious when it was him, but legally, they wouldn't be able to prosecute him because of the lack of evidence, even when the crime so obviously had his name all over it.

There had been that one time when he had visited a small town in America only for it to be completely and utterly obliterated with no survivors. It was obviously the Angel who had done it, but there wasn't even a weapon that couldn't have done that, leaving the law enforcement to tear out their hair while they tried to chase after a criminal who had murdered hundreds.

If only they knew how many more lives he'd saved.

"Oi, get down here, Lexxie!"

The Angel was jolted out of his reverie by a familiar, obnoxious voice.

He sometimes regretted ever saving Tom from Scorpia's trap.

He sighed and said, "Don't you remember what I said the first time you called me that? _**Don't call me that.**_"

"Umm... Alex? I don't know if you've noticed, but you're doing it again..."

Alex shook his head, and the murderous look in his eyes faded. "Don't call me that."

Tom laughed in relief to see his friend had not gone crazy and gone on a killing spree again. That had been scary. Alex had run through an entire city like a murderous tornado of murderous fury and spinny death blades of murderous death and destruction. The place had never really recovered, and the last time Tom had checked, it looked like some sort of post apocalyptic wasteland that would look perfect as the setting for a video game. Glass, concrete, and corpses, both animal and human alike littered the streets. Crows had flown overhead feasting on the dead meat. Some vultures had also somehow made it there, and what wasn't eaten by the birds was being eaten by the dogs, nearly starving to death and foaming at the mouths. Even humans had joined in, fighting with knives and guns, and when those were useless, with nails and teeth. The place was probably completely deserted by now, except for maybe a few humans who were lucky and smart enough to survive, and probably a lot of birds feasting on the rodents of the city that would doubtlessly come.

"Well, we've got a new mission from Phoenix. There's this woman calling herself Dolores Sayle who's obsessed with Herod Sayle. Apparently she wants revenge on you for "killing her soul mate" and "daring to attempt to stain the beautiful bonds of love"."

Alex shuddered in disgust. Why were some people so crazy? Heck, even he was saner than most people on Earth, even though he was a cold blooded murderer and assassin-for-hire! "Tell me what they have on her, what her intentions are, and what do we get out of this?"

"Well, she wants to kill you—"

Alex snorted. He had heard this many times before, to the point of hearing it at the beginning of almost every mission. "What else is new?"

"If you had just let me finish, I would have told you. She's capturing Portuguese men-of-war and from what I've heard, they're in danger from going extinct because she doesn't understand how to take care of them properly."

Alex sighed and stood up. "Okay, let's go."

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><p>Turns out they didn't really need to kill her.<p>

She accidentally fell into a tank full of them and Alex and Tom laughed gleefully as they released the Portuguese men-of war back into the ocean.

Just for fun, they stabbed one of his knives into her forehead with a note.

"Can you guys please stop sending me these incompetent villains and give me an actual challenge?"

The note was intended for the universe, but MI6 panicked when they got a hold of it. Apparently the entire thing had been a trick to lure Alex out by reminding him of the time with Stormbreaker. Dolores was actually being paid by MI6 to flush him out of hiding, although she wasn't actually an agent. (Well, at least, he doubted that she was. What kind of agent falls into a tank with Portuguese men-of-war in it?)

MI6 was ready to kill off an entire species just so they could kind their top spy, who might've been dead. Not that he was, but still! He had left his name behind with the rest of his old life; there was no way MI6 could've found out that the legendary Angel was actually Alex Rider.

A few days later, MI6 was begging for forgiveness from the Angel and tried to pin the blame on someone else.

Alex smirked and passed the note over to Tom, who then laughed so hard he began crying.

Sometimes, life really was worth it.

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><p><strong>I know, I finally finished it! Funny thing is, I actually began writing this right after the second chapter.<strong>

**But here it is! :D**

**There will be another chapter after this just to wrap it all up and to complete the circle. I'm finished writing it already, so you won't have to wait very long. I just need to proofread it, so it'll be out in a few days at the most, so stay tuned! (nope, never saying that again)**

**-Lightning**


	4. Chapter 4

**...**

**Well, here we are. This chapter is more abstract and open ended than the others before it. Interpret it as you wish. I'm really not sure what to feel about it...**

**Writing this was really fun, and all I can say about this fic is, it's been fantastic.**

**-Lightning**

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><p><em>And the circle was complete.<em>

_But when did it start?_

Alex Rider was the beginning, or was he the end?

John Rider had joined MI6.

Ian Rider had followed suit and trained Alex to become the best spy on Earth.

So Alex became the best spy on Earth. His name would be whispered in tones of hushed awe for the rest of eternity. No one knew whether he was still dead or alive, even though years had passed.

Alex Rider was many things.

He wasn't quite an assassin, not quite a mercenary, not quite anything in particular. He didn't fall into any categories cleanly.

He showed mercy, outright sadism, a hero complex, and thousands of other facets of his personality that words couldn't quite capture.

He was simply Alex.

He seemed to be one of the universe's favourite punching bags, yet it seemed the world revolved around him and adored him.

He was the whirlwind of destruction that was to be never provoked under any circumstances; he was the Angel that brought only death. Shadows slinked away from his very presence, a chill wind whipped up whenever some poor fool attempted to cross him, bullets veered off course from the creature that did not seem to have ever been anything remotely human, and the universe seemed to bend to his will. He was feared and revered, his name whispered in the wind as a quiet, ominous foretelling of death wherever he went.

The scum of the world cowered under his icy piercing gaze, but even with his obvious distaste for the megalomaniacs that tried to take over the world on a daily basis, the side the claimed to be "good" hated and feared him.

(sometimes, his life really sucked.)

There were rumours of him being a god from ancient times, of him being the devil, of him being a man cursed to forever wander the earth in eternity as punishment for his crimes.

They were all obviously untrue, but that didn't stop that tiny sliver of doubt that wormed into people's minds and wondered if maybe, just maybe, that they were true.

Alex didn't do anything to dispel the rumours.

People always wondered why he snickered when they mentioned those rumours and ohgodwhywashecoveredinblooda ndlookinglikehe'djustwonthelottery.

(what? he might've been the top assassin in the world, but he was still a teenager, after all, and he need to get his kicks from somewhere.)

A boy named Julius had gotten plastic surgery to look exactly like the legendary spy, wanting to make his friends stop worshipping their idol, who they believed was still alive.

He aimed the gun at the prime minister.

A gunshot rang out and there was silence.

Julius was dead from a bullet wound coming from an angle that should have been impossible.

There wasn't any bullet found, not even an exit wound.

A man claiming to be Alex Rider would lure children away, doing unspeakable things to them.

He died of a knife to the heart, a legendary, feather-shaped knife, the one that not even masters of their trade could ever possibly hope to replicate, before he had been able to claim his third victim.

And yet another foolish person though he would be able to get away with trying to tarnish the honour of John Rider's name, citing some family feud that had never really existed.

He disappeared and only showed up days later, hung by his organs from a bus… with no evidence of who or what could have done it.

Alex Rider had created someone who could be his almost equal, Tom Harris. He was the last link of the circle. Alex never had a son, knowing that he would never be able to stop long enough to care for someone that young.

Tom Harris was many things.

He was an assassin, he was a friend to Alex Rider, the unapproachable legend that light seemed to hide from, he was the Demon.

He was the savior of children and innocents everywhere, he was the idol of every new recruit, he was the one all the evils in the world cursed with their dying breath. He was ironically loved by the general populace as a force of "good", even though Alex had saved the world so many more times without even a thank you. He was bathed in the blood of innocents, but people still loved him.

(he still really couldn't figure out why the fangirl tried to molest him even though he had made it obvious that he held no qualms over killing someone "innocent" in cold blood.)

Then there was that incident with the leopard… moving on.

But there was something he would never, ever be—left behind in Alex Rider's shadow.

If he fell behind, Alex would hatch a brilliant scheme to make his name just as well known as Alex's. They held hands together in the relay race of life, and when it was their time to pass on the baton, Tom found a young boy on the streets in London during Christmas. He wanted to prevent anyone else from having the same life as him, and Tom took him on as an apprentice.

His name was John, and he was by no means the end of the circle, but he was the one to pass on the legacy of the Riders.

_And where did the circle end?_

_It had only just begun._

_"How can I be a spy like you, Lex?"_

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><p><strong>This is the very last chapter of Loop.<strong>

**Well, it's supposed to be. I really can't make any promises, but I really don't think there will be any more chapters after this.**

**I'll see you next time I post a fanfic, but until then, goodbye.**

**-Lightning**

**EDIT 16/3/13: I added the last line, which was how the story started off. Keep in mind that I will not continue this, and I only added the last bit so that this story ended the same way if began.**


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